soapboxing a memorial, why? did a gay fireman die?
seven years already, wow. the smoke is getting foggy.
just a few weeks after 911 i took mom into the city to pay our respects. i forget now, it was either our last or second to last trip before alzheimer's made travel impossible. so many people touched by this still. wiki shows 2,974 people died. my uncle, an accountant in the area, lost a few friends and acquaintences and a cousin lost her brother-in-law. i didn't know any of the dead, but i remembered as a kid watching the twin towers under construction and i could see as an adult their destruction affecting this country.
i thought the towers were impressive but ugly. at my last vist to them years before, i enjoyed the views from the observation deck and having drinks with my now deceased partner at the top of the world.
memorials were set up in many locations throughout the area. here's a lookout park off a highway in new jersey near where we were staying with relatives.
a visitor to that memorial
here's mom in her sneakers waiting for the train. i decided it was too crazy to try to drive into the city.
we made our way on new york's subway system to just blocks from ground zero. i recall the odd silence everywhere, no horns honking, especially, made it a little harder to find the subway exit.
we got to within a block or three from what was left of the twin towers, just a smoldering heap of destruction about six or seven stories high.
many of the roads were fenced or barricaded. workers on the way in and out. dumps hauling away the remains. it was quite a scene.
i got disoriented on our way out and couldn't find my way back to the subway. so i thought if we walked away from the area we could catch a cab uptown. but there streets were deserted, not a cab, not a bus, not a pedestrian for blocks upon blocks.
i was worried that my mom couldn't handle the walking but she was such a trooper. and we were both just walking, numb from what we'd just observed. finally i heard some people up ahead. we turned a corner and came upon some more makeshift memorials which were all around the city. this one, ribbons on a fence.
found there a subway entrance and made our way up to time square where we were meeting a friend for dinner. the subways memorialized the dead underground with pictures and flowers and candles burning and one even with paper cranes.
out of the subway, time square was like another world, far removed from ground zero but for reminders now and then.